KEY POINTS:
I wilt slightly under our guide Dave's icy stare. Admitting you're a Liverpool fan at Old Trafford, the home of arch-rivals Manchester United, is perhaps not the smartest thing I ever did.
Then, Dave remembers it's been 18 long, barren years since Liverpool last won the English title,
and his expression changes to one of slightly smug pity.
Compare Liverpool's recent record (and the fact it feels, at times, like it might take another 18 years before things come right) with that of Manchester United.
The club has just added the Champions League trophy as Europe's top club to their 18th English title (but still one behind Liverpool I took great pleasure in reminding everyone). Standing in Manchester United's museum, bulging as it is with trophies, it's appropriate to let Dave be a little smug and proud.
As well as the shiny awards, the museum is chock-full of memorabilia collected since the club was first established as the Newton Heath Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway Football Club in 1878.
There are tributes to the 1958 Busby Babes who died in the Munich air disaster, another to the mercurial Eric Cantona who was arguably the best foreigner to play in England but who will also be remembered for his kung-fu kick on a Crystal Palace fan during a game. And yet more to the 1999 side who won the treble - the English Premier League, the FA Cup and the European Club Championship.
There are estimated to be more than 330,000 Manchester United disciples around the world, but few are as passionate and informed as Dave - clearly a devotee as well as a guide. And like him, most people who flock to Old Trafford to tour the ground and museum are ardent United fans. For many, a journey there is like some kind of pilgrimage, something that must be done at least once in their lives.
For non-believers like me it is still a fascinating place, filled with football history, facts and figures.
Although today Old Trafford is a state-of-the-art stadium, in 1910 it cost just 60,000 ($150,000) to build ("most players wouldn't consider buying a car for less than that," as Dave so aptly puts it).
Most of that original building save the players' tunnel (no longer used but incorporated into the modern stadium as something of a monument), was lost to bombing in World War II.
Nowadays, below the hallowed turf, 30km of plastic piping is used to prevent the ground from freezing during the cold Lancashire winters. From above, heat lamps beam down like some sophisticated cannabis operation to ensure the grass grows.
Dotted around the ground are 161 CCTV cameras, which have the ability to zoom on to any one of the 76,312 seats, to see whether Tom, Dick and Harry are behaving themselves. If they're not, they might be thrown into one of the three police cells in the bowels of the stadium to cool off. Altogether, some 2000 people are employed on any given match day to ensure the operation runs smoothly.
When you're the world's most famous football club, things are supposed to go off without a hitch, even if the result might not be to everyone's liking.
The tour also includes a visit to the players' dressing room - the very one where modern-day heroes Rooney and Ronaldo get kitted up for games (each player is given four different shirts - one for each half as well as one long-sleeved and one short-sleeved shirt), and where they are fed three or four jaffa cakes for sustenance at half-time.
We're shown where Ferdinand and Tevez eat before kick-off, where Giggs and Scholes relax in the players' lounge and we even sit in the heated Audi racing seats where Manchester United's famous manager Sir Alex Ferguson and the team's substitutes sit during games.
Later that day, I return to Old Trafford for a Champions League game against Russian side Dynamo Kiev.
As I watch those famed players dart about the field, all those anecdotes and stories from the stadium tour seem to filter down, adding more life to this, the beautiful game.
For all this history behind the club, right now the only thing that matters is this game, this result.
This time I keep my Liverpool allegiance to myself - I'm a little outnumbered by 76,000 rabid, proud Manchester United fans.
* Michael Brown flew to the UK courtesy of Flight Centre.
